


bucky VI

by captainstarspangled



Series: when team members make peter cry [27]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Crying, Cutting, Hurt Peter Parker, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Protective Bucky Barnes, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-04 13:42:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18605695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainstarspangled/pseuds/captainstarspangled
Summary: Peter only wanted to try out what was oh so relieving about hurting yourself.Bucky is a great uncle.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> TW in the tags!
> 
> hrm... some of you might've seen endgame by now. I'm gonna watch it again on sunday, been on and off crying all week :').

Peter was just starting his second year at junior high when his classmates first discussed the topic of self injury. It had recently become a rumour that one of the students, Emily, had been caught by a teacher while she was cleaning bloody blades in a restroom after school, and the 13 year olds went crazy at that. 

"It's just so dumb. Imagine being a bit sad and then ruining your whole body about it," Flash said and the kids laughed along with him, while Peter said at his desk and just listened along. Yes, Flash was right, it did sound a bit stupid to him too, but there had to be something about it, right? Otherwise Emily wouldn't do that to herself. 

Peter sat down on the other side of Emily's table at lunch the next morning. Since the day people found out, she'd been sitting alone, which Peter found dumber than what people were saying about her. Who were they to judge someone for feeling sad? 

"Hi," Peter said carefully, and placed his lunch tray in front of himself. 

"Hey Peter," Emily said, her voice sad and even more careful. "If you're here to see them, I won't show you," Emily said, even quieter, and tugged at the sleeves of her shirt. 

"I don't wanna see them," Peter stated, and looked her in the eyes. "I uh... I just wanna know why. And not like what set it off but what does this bring to you that makes it worth it?"

"Hm... I guess it's kind of hard to describe. It just... changes something in me. I honestly don't know. And I also don't want to motivate you to try."

Peter couldn't stop thinking about the topic while he sat with Emily and made stupid jokes to cheer her up. The last class of the day was biology, where they were dissecting a frog, using scalpels and, oh well, razor blades. Unable to keep his curiosity in, Peter slipped three of those into his pocket, just in case. 

When he arrived at home, Peter placed those three blades in a small tin box for mints, and put them into his bedside table. 

 

For almost three months, Peter completely forgot about them. During that time, something changed in him. He became more aware of his surroundings, fought a lot with his dads, his grades dropped and he didn't know why. For his parents and the team, it was obvious that his puberty was kicking off properly. Peter ate more, gained some weight and spent most of his time alone in his room, for he didn't really have friends. 

Peter got home on a Friday night after the worst day in his life. He had got back a bad grade in biology, the teacher gave him detention for a two minute tardy and Flash slammed him into a locker, from which his shoulder still hurt. Pops and dad were going away for the weekend, and Peter honestly couldn't wait for them to leave. 

"Hey Pete, I told you to clean your room on Tuesday," Pops said when he saw his son walking in. 

"I'm sorry, I forgot," Peter said in an annoyed tone and dropped his backpack next to the door. He walked to the kitchen, put a poptart into the toaster and grabbed a juice box from the fridge. 

"I want you to do that tonight, this place will be clean when we're back on Sunday or you're grounded for next week."

"Grounded?" Peter said in an annoyed tone, laughing at his pops. "I'm not seven pops." 

"Then stop acting like you are," Steve said when the toaster binged and Peter threw his poptart on a plate. 

"Fine," Peter said and walked out of the kitchen and towards his room. 

"Where are you going?" The teenager rolled his eyes and turned around. 

"To my room?"

"What about cleaning this up?" Steve gestured to the entire living room area.

"I'll do it when you're gone, jesus christ," he hissed and was about to stomp away when Pops spoke up.

"Hey, you do not get to talk to me like that. I'm your father and I demand at least some respect."

Peter frowned but didn't say a word.

"What on earth happened to you, you used to be such a cheery and friendly little boy and now you've transformed into this little monster," Steve said, almost yelled. 

"I don't know pops, okay? I'm sorry I'm not the kid you love anymore but life's tough and I can't deal with everything at once," Peter exclaimed and finally turned on his heel and walked to his room. "Enjoy your weekend!" Peter screamed and then slammed the door shut. 

 

He paced up and down his room for a few minutes, not knowing what to do. Then he remembered. Oh. 

It hurt a lot more than Peter had thought it would, and it bled a lot less than he thought because he didn't dare to cut deep. He had made three cuts beneath the crease of his elbow when there was a knock at the door and the teenager pulled his sleeve back down and threw the bloody razorblades into his bedside table. 

"Hey sport, we're leaving," dad's voice said and Peter got up and opened his door, hugging Tony very tight. The man pressed a kiss to Peter's head. 

"Tell pops I'm a bit sorry but I don't wanna see him until Sunday," Peter said and Tony chuckled. "I will, Bucky will be here if you need anything."

Back in his room, Peter examined his arm. The cuts were just a tad red and there was nothing else to it. So he did three more, a bit deeper, soaking the blade in blood. 

He put the bloody utensil on his nightstand because with pops and dad gone, he was alone in this apartment, and no one could walk in on him, so he didn't bother to hide them for now. 

 

As Peter was taking a shower a few minutes later, Bucky came into the apartment to ask the kid if he was up for movies and pizza. After Jarvis told him that the boy was taking a shower, he went into his room and waited for Peter to be done. 

Peter dropped his towel on the floor when he walked back into his room after a few minutes, dressed in sweats, and found Bucky examining the bloody blade. "Uncle Bucky? What are you doing here?" Peter was shocked, he didn't even know what to tell the man. 

"I wanted to ask you if you want pizza," Bucky mumbled, obviously distraught as well. "What's going on Peter?" 

The boy shrugged his shoulders and sat down on the bed next to his uncle, eyes already filling with tears. "I don't know, it's just been so stressful lately," he admitted. There was silence for a second. 

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know just. School and people and all that. And now pops hates me because I'm not his nice little boy anymore and it just sucks so much," Peter said, tears flowing down his cheeks. He wiped them away as they came. 

"Peter, your pops doesn't hate you. He's worried about you." The boy frowned at his uncle and then laid his head in the man's lap. 

"Didn't sound like it when he was yelling at me before."

"Steve was yelling?" Bucky asked, a puzzled look on his face. 

Peter shrugged his shoulder. "Okay, he was telling me off." 

"Pete, it's totally normal for you to have arguments with your parents at your age," Bucky said, streaking Peter's hair off his forehead. "But there's healthier ways to deal with that." 

Peter raised his eyebrows. "I know, it's ridiculous that I even tried this," he said, laughing a little but it was a sad laugh. 

"No Pete, nothing is ridiculous when it makes you feel the need to hurt yourself. I'm just saying that maybe trying to do sports, or read, or write or draw or whatever that's not so destructive to yourself would be a better option than this," he said and gestured to the blade. "Talk, if you need to. We're all here for you and willing to help." 

Peter nodded, feeling warmth rush through his body and his heart. 

 

Together with uncle Bucky, Peter flushed those blades down the toilet that evening before ordering a pizza. 

Before they started to watch the movie though, Peter cleaned up the living room area and called his pops to apologize, succesfully only crying a little on the phone.


	2. the talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve and Tony confront their son about what Bucky had found out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just saw endgame again and cried my eyes out this time, last time it took me until I woke up in the morning. the guy next to me was crying and so was some guy in front of me... I feel so terrible atm, like someone has just taken my entire will to live of the past few years and torn it apart like it was nothing.

Sometime throughout the movie, Peter paused it and looked over at his uncle. “Are you going to tell them?” 

Bucky licked his lips and looked at his nephew. “Peter… You know I have to.” 

“W-Why?” Peter knew he didn’t really have a say in this, not even a possibility to blackmail him. 

“Peter, they are the ones who have to take care of you and make sure you’re okay. I can’t keep this from them.”

Well, Bucky was right about that, but now Peter was terrified. 

 

For the rest of the weekend, Peter stayed up extremely late every night, worrying about the situation. What were his parents gonna say when they found out? Would he be punished? 

Peter slept in on both days, and spent the rest of most reading and doing homework. He ate three meals a day with Bucky, and refused to talk about the topic, or much at all. 

Before he knew, pops and dad walked through the elevator doors while he was watching tv on the couch. 

Pops walked to stand in front of the couch part peter was lying on. “I’m sorry I told you off like that. I love you the way you are,” he said and placed his bag on the couch when Peter got up and walked over to hug his father tight. Thanks to the height of the couch, Peter was actually on the man’s eye level for once.

Tony soon joined in on the hug, and they stood like that for quite a bit before finishing off the night eating takeout and watching a lame comedy no one was focused on and Peter enjoyed cuddling his fathers the entire time. 

 

The next morning, Peter didn’t feel that well, but he knew better than staying home and being close when his parents found out. 

So he just went to school instead and spent the day worrying. 

He dreaded every second clicking down to the point of the day he could finally go home. The walk through the streets of New York was a great distraction before his encounter with his parents. 

Just as he had expected, Peter found dad and pops sitting on the couch when he came through the elevator door. 

Putting his backpack to the side, he approached the couch when his dad told him they had to talk. 

The teenager took a seat between his fathers, took a deep breath and finally dared to look them in the eyes.

Dad’s eyes were sad and tired, and full of worry. The look of pops’ face brought tears to Peter’s eyes; it was clear he’d been crying, the rims of his blue eyes were red, and his cheeks were still a bit wet in parts. 

Peter wanted to speak up, to tell them that he’d only done it once, that he was okay and none of what had happened was their fault. But his mouth seemed sealed, he couldn’t open it to say anything. 

Steve took a deep breath and began. “Bucky told us what happened, what he saw on Friday.” He placed a hand on his son’s leg and continued. “I can’t really explain to myself what happened though. I mean, you were the happiest child just a few months ago, and I know times change, but I didn’t know how dark it was.” Steve’s face crumpled, and Peter felt Tony stiffen next to him. 

Peter’s heart stung with guilt, and so did his eyes, and he finally opened his mouth to speak. “It’s not as bad as you think it is guys. It’s just so confusing.” Peter’s voice had broken towards the end of his sentence, and Steve’s tears spilled over at that, which in response made Peter cry, too. 

“Are you… suicidal?” Steve made big eyes at his husband, but then went back to looking at Peter, continuously wiping the tears off his cheeks. 

“No. I love my life most times. The past few months have been so stressful and I wanted to see what the big thing behind it was. W-Why Emily did it.” 

Steve took a breath. He had heard about Emily, Peter’s teacher had called him personally because she thought Peter was a friend of Emily. 

“Oh Pete. Look, the thing with Emily is that she is mentally ill. There is a lot of pain and sadness in that girl that she cannot handle on her own. And I surely hope you don’t understand what I mean, and that you never will. All you can do about her is being there, listening, appreciating her and just spending time with her, showing her what’s fun at life because I know you know very well.”

Tony placed a hand on Peter’s shoulder, while Steve put his arm around the boy’s shoulder to touch his husband. “No, I’m definitely not as bad as she is. It was a stupid idea to begin with and in the heat of the moment I didn’t know how else to react.” When he was younger, Peter would just bawl his eyes out and calm down while crying, but it’d been different on Friday, and he hadn’t liked how it’d turned out at all. Emily had been right, it was nowhere near worth it. 

“Oh Peter,” pops said as Peter turned and let himself be hugged tightly by the man, both of them crying and appreciating each other. 

Tony sat by and watched that scene, tears in his eyes as well. He was so glad his son got to have the kind of father he’d never had, and there were even two of them. He hoped dearly that his kid right here would always stay such a compassionate and loving boy, whom no one could do harm to because if someone did, he would literally kill that person, and so would about 20 other people living in the same building. 

Peter would be fine, and if not, everyone would be there for him, he would never have to deal with anything alone.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been thinking about this series and when I will finish it and start something new, maybe a series when Peter comes home from college on the weekends and the shit they're up to :D


End file.
